Essential Research: 54-46 to Labor

Reasonably good personal ratings are the only consolation Scott Morrison can take from another diabolical poll result.

The Guardian reports the Coalition’s recovery in Essential Research a fortnight ago has proved shortlived – Labor has gained two points on two-party preferred to lead 54-46, returning to where they were the poll before last. Both major parties are up on the primary vote, Labor by four points to 39% and the Coalition by one to 38%. We will have to wait on the full report later today for the minor parties. The monthly personal ratings have Scott Morrison up one on approval to 42% and down three on disapproval to 34%, while Bill Shorten is down three to 35% and down one to 43%. Morrison leads 40-29 as preferred prime minister, barely changed on 41-29 last time.

Also featured are questions on Labor’s dividend imputation policies and negative gearing policies. The former had the support of 39% and the opposition of 30%. On restricting negative gearing to new homes, 24% said it would reduce house prices; 21% said it would increase them; and 27% believed it would make no difference. Thirty-seven per cent believed it would lead to higher rents, 14% to lower rents and 24% make no difference. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1032.

UPDATE: Full report here. Greens down one to 10%, One Nation down one to 6%.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.
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Anyways, I’d like one of the supporters of the police state on here to explain how terrorists would be caught if they reverted to handwritten communications which were then subsequently burnt or eaten after being memorised?

Telephoto lenses should do the trick. 🙂

How would they know where to point the lens? Even if they did it’s really not that hard to hide what’s written on them from any such lens.

You’re getting desperate now. Um, it’s their job to know how to do it.

Cheeses wept, if you can’t figure out how to obscure a small handwritten note from any and all telephoto lenses one can only wonder how you manage to dress yourself each day.

Dan

I urge all people u to take up pigeon fancying. Much more secure method of sending messages.

I read somewhere that in Russia in high security areas they have stopped using computes and reverted to typewriters and carbon paper. I imagine something similar will happen here. Commercial firms worried about trade secrets or say pricing for a tender will just stop using electronic systems and revert to systems that cannot be hacked .

Today had nothing to do with legislation. It was just strategic politics.

Morrison tried to (1) avoid a vote on the Phelps bill in the House and (b) use manipulation of the encryption bill to wedge Shorten with bad publicity about “national security” for the next 3 months, sans any blowback in the (non-sitting) parliament. Just as he did in his loud presser this morning.

It was not a weak Shorten backing down. It was a strategic Shorten playing the cards before him.

Bed wetters should note two things.

First, Shorten countered Morrison and blocked his move.

Second, the JPISC (6 Coalition members, 5 Labor members) have spent months consulting with the tech industry, civil rights people, security agencies, and others, and came up with a batch of unanimous amendments. They support the legislation if it includes those amendments. So…….. the 11 most informed representatives in the nation who have considered all the ifs and buts, support the legislation if amended.

That’s good enough for me. It’s democracy.

I agree. The greens had already stated that they were going to block two of the ALP amendments. If the ALP found that unacceptable, then no amendments would have been made and the bill would go through anyway.

The single outstanding feature of today’s ranting by the faux Left has been the fist-shaking at Labor. The Liberals are immune, it seems. Labor are always to blame.

Well, Liberal bastardry is expected.

Labor was supposed to be better than that. And they easily could have been. All they had to do was pass one of their own amendments. Or vote the thing down outright with the crossbenchers. They were in a position to do either. They inexplicably chose to do neither, and are rightly criticized for it.

Also, what’s ‘faux left’ about opposing destroying privacy to thwart made-up terrorists? If you ignore everything that’s technically wrong/inept with the legislation, that’s basically what’s left. Why would the ‘real left’ support that? Sacrificing liberties to stay safe from made-up terrorists is the domain of the right.

It would be a very bad idea for people with something they wish to conceal (irrespective of their reasons, good or bad) to revert to using typewriters as this will make them stand out as a target.

Those pesky Russkies were particularly adept at compromising typewriters so as to gather information, and the paranoid might suspect the story “in Russia in high security…” is a plant based on that association.

It would be a very bad idea for people with something they wish to conceal (irrespective of their reasons, good or bad) to revert to using typewriters as this will make them stand out as a target.

Those pesky Russkies were particularly adept at compromising typewriters so as to gather information, and the paranoid might suspect the story “in Russia in high security…” is a plant based on that association.

Probably because the President is either not invited to the funeral, or is forbidden from delivering a speech, thereby meaning that the public gets to witness an entire event without hearing from him. That would be enough to make anyone feel good, surely.

It is you who has been up to your ears in group think tonight, and wetting your pants.

As you well know as a surgeon,there are many things that go on in an operating theatre that the general public does not know and would not understand.

So too with national security. You are a mere member of the public. There are any things that go on in the national security “operating theatre” which you do not know about and which you would not understand.

However, the bi-party JPISC has seen and heard all the detail, and they support the legislation if amended.

That bi-party group are our elected reps …. you may disagree with their decision, but I doubt that you are as knowledgeable as they are in this matter. That’s our system. Period.

I certainly have more faith in their considerations than I do in your less informed view.

I suspect the biggest impact of the encryption legislation will be on Australian-based software companies like Atlassian, who’ll end up needing to move offshore rather than lose a large number of clients.

I suspect the biggest impact of the encryption legislation will be on Australian-based software companies like Atlassian, who’ll end up needing to move offshore rather than lose a large number of clients.

We’ll find out what Atlassian investors think of today’s events when the Nasdaq opens in about 40 minutes time.

Watcha
Having met quite a few politicians, I’m happy to say their opinion on most matters is worthless and the majority are oxygen thieves. So I’m not at all impressed that a few deadbeat Labor and Liberal hacks chosen for a security committee as a factional deal have given the thumbs up to the legislation.

However, the bi-party JPISC has seen and heard all the detail, and they support the legislation if amended.

That’s the whole point, isn’t it? It wasn’t amended.

And I don’t give a rat’s arse what Cormann “promises”, the Coalition will do as they bloody well please now that it’s been passed – both the Libs generally, and Scummo in particular, have form on this going back to the earliest days of the Abbott Government. The time to get amendments to this bill was before it passed, not after – although Labor seems to be getting that backwards a lot lately (see: TPP).

We’ve gone 17 Christmases since 9/11 without a credible Christmas terrorism threat – please pardon me if I don’t quite believe the Libs’ bleating on the “urgency” of passing this POS legislation.

@C@tmomma: You’re drumming up fear left, right and centre – if I believed you, I’d be clutching my (nonexistent) pearls frantically, all agog at the prospect of Imminent Terrah Attack 24/7. Fortunately, I don’t blindly believe anyone – although I respect you more than most.

It’s been 17 years since 9/11, and we’ve had a total of nine “terrorist attacks” (plus two plots caught short of fruition) in all that time – at least seven of which seem to have been lone-wolf, “inspired by but not taking orders from X” attacks. The eighth, incidentally, was committed by a Bangladeshi less than a week after she arrived in Australia – so any communications were made long before she came under our jurisdiction.

Since a lone-wolf attack has no command structure (even at the action-cell level) and doesn’t require communications per se between a perpetrator and their inspiration, I’m at a loss as to how such legislation would plausibly help detect or intercept them short of fulfillment. In addition to my doubts of its efficacy, I don’t like the form the legislation has taken, after having spent a few hours reading it and crossreferencing a lot of the Acts it amends.

One important thing about “anti-terrorism” legislation is to examine the fine-print – which in this case is terrible. It adds layers of authority as to who can issue computer-access warrants (the AAT, for example, can do so – despite not being judges). Its definition of reasons to issue such warrants is very broad (for example, suspected welfare fraud(!) is now a reason to have your computer seized). And it allows far, far too much room for Ministerial discretion when it comes to the ‘safeguards’ allegedly protecting our rights, in a legal system which already allows Ministers to strip away most of our civil rights on a whim.

It’s bad legislation, granting security agencies powers that wouldn’t have foiled any of the terrorist attacks to date and giving our too-powerful Ministers even more power. If Labor had any real concerns about the rule of law (as opposed to the rule of Ministerial fiat), we should have stuck to our guns and blocked this legislation until it could be extensively rewritten. To our shame, we did not.

I am extremely disappointed by our Parliamentary caucus in this matter. Extremely disappointed.

IMO nearly everyone on this blog (myself included) are political tragics. Joe/Josie Voter doesn’t give a damn about things like s44, or who did or didn’t play ‘smart’ in parliament. They regard Canberra as a sort of kindergarten play-pen. They want to feel safe in their beds, and can’t spell encryption . I think they feel strongly about torturing children!
Shorten lets a piss weak ‘security’ measure through, which can be amended next year. He calls the Govt out for the heartless pricks they are to little children, and does all this without playing silly games, and without giving the troglodytes even a twig to hit him with about security.
Of course the Greens can wash their hands, and tut-tut, but Labor will get on preparing to run the country.
.

Comments like this in the media don’t help
‘Australia’s security and intelligence agencies have legal authority to force encryption services to break the encryptions.’

And I’ve even noticed the majority of users here think they understand the legislation along the same lines as the above

That’s because it does, right there in the Act. I’ve read it for myself; you can too right here.

The money quote(s) is on filepage 29-30 (index p 25-26)

Listed acts or things

The acts or things that may be specified in a technical assistance notice given to a designated communications provider include (but are not limited to) listed acts or things, so long as those acts or things:

(a) are in connection with any or all of the eligible activities of the provider; and
(b) are covered by subsection (2).

(1) For the purposes of the application of this Part to a designated communications provider, listed act or thing means:
(a) removing one or more forms of electronic protection that are or were applied by, or on behalf of, the provider; or

(continues at some length)

The various security agencies can now order ISPs to bypass their own encryption upon the Government’s say-so. No warrant required. No appeal possible.

So if the understanding you’ve described as inaccurate, then what is the “accurate” understanding?

That makes sense. It just shows how utterly inept this “government” is. This encryption idiocy will be fought tooth and nail by the tech giants. It will probably even be rejected by the High Court. However if it does pass all those hurdles, it will kill off nay chance at all of Australia becoming a player in the armaments export industry.

Morrison may not have lost the vote, but his prime ministerial authority is waning

…
Morrison had hoped to emerge by close of business minus the humiliating defeat and plus a political fight with Labor on national security.

That was the precise plot twist sought.

A national security fight is a handy fight to have, when fights are all that’s left, when your only pitch is that your opponent is a brigand.

But Bill Shorten knows the fight he’s in, and can see the finish line before him, near and yet so far.

Getting to that finish line trumps everything. On Thursday night, it trumped face saving. It trumped dignity.

After going toe-to-toe with Morrison all day, Shorten waited until after the television news bulletins, then promptly surrendered unconditionally on national security, waving through the encryption laws he’d earlier demanded be amended.

The alternative to abject surrender was giving Morrison some political grip, and as close observers of the human condition know – the grip of a drowning man can be lethal.

That would be the same Katharine Murphy who wrote all those hagiographies to Malcolm Turnbull I take it?

The same Katharine Murphy who told everyone that Mediscare was a lie?

The same Katharine Murphy who had the biggest story of last year sitting in her lap (Barnaby Rootgate), but ignored it and wrote six articles in the space of a week about how Adani was a big problem for Bill Shorten?

Rick Wilson shames Trump again …. Wilson praises HW Bush for getting the last laugh on Trump by forcing him to attend memorial and be miserable

Trump could’ve ruined Bush’s funeral. Bush didn’t let him.

By including the current president, the late president preempted his successor’s proclivity for draining the dignity out of solemn occasions.

By insisting on his successor’s inclusion in the proceedings, Bush forced the current White House occupant to briefly abandon his unfrozen cave-man act, denying him the chance to further debase the office of president by siphoning the dignity out of 41’s final hours in D.C. — something 45 likely would have relished, given the opportunity.

We were never likely to have armanents industry and if by some quantum leap in business acumen in the future most factors including encryption will have altered and have nil effect on anything.
Labor and Shorten yesterday snookered the LNP and Morrison from belting out the security/refugee/boatspeople smuggler/Sudanese nonsense from being front and centre and the only hope the LNP and Morrison have of not being tossed out on their collective ears whenever the next election is held.
The Greens as usual, grappling with any issue to make themselves relevant and to hide their shame resulting from their collaboration with the LNP in hobbling any meaningful progress in taking steps to halt the progress od global warming.
Just lets have an election and discontinue this political parody that the LNP has become.

Trump claims his approval rating would be ‘75%’ without Mueller’s ‘presidential harassment’

President Donald Trump on Thursday broke his silence in the wake of former President George H.W. Bush’s funeral to once again attack special counsel Robert Mueller and his probe of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

“Without the phony Russia Witch Hunt, and with all that we have accomplished in the last almost two years (Tax & Regulation Cuts, Judge’s, Military, Vets, etc.) my approval rating would be at 75% rather than the 50% just reported by Rasmussen,” the president wrote. “It’s called Presidential Harassment!”

Former Department of Justice official Matthew Miller told MSNBC on Thursday that he fully expected special counsel Robert Mueller to throw the book at President Trump’s convicted former campaign chair Paul Manafort and make an example out of him for lying.

“Given the fact that Manafort took the somewhat egregious step to lie to the special prosecutor after he signed cooperation agreement, you can look for them to recommend a jail sentence that puts him in prison likely for the rest of his life,” he added.

Goll;
Thats like saying we where never going to keep the Car Industry anyway, so it was ok for the Libs to chase them away.

I agree an arms industry was a bit unlikely to happen, but the Libs have been pushing it for a while, and the anti-encryption legislation will make it more difficult for foreigners to trust the Australian Government.

bug1
A completely different set of technological circumstances exist now is a massive understatement. The pace of change within the armanents industry would at best allow Australia to have a bit part and be at the mercy of the major players.
Many factors make Australia unattractive to develop industry. Any future industrial progress will involve using our most abundant resources sunshine, wind and stuff we dig out the ground. Food production is at the goodwill of the Gods of climate change.

This gives 39/204 x 100 = 19%, which is the most optimistic result I have seen. And renewables are showing recent steady good growth in production 0ver the last three years,
and nearly doubling since 2009. (28, 34, 39 for the last three years)

But greenhouse gas emissions are way up for the whole energy sector, negating the gains made during the carbon price scheme.

Jericho says:

There is no reality in which we are on track to meet our (pathetic) Paris targets “in a canter”. Nothing in the figures suggest we have made “solid progress”.

These latest emissions figures remain an utter condemnation of this government’s complete lack of care about climate change and are an indictment on all of those who have served in its ranks – especially its three prime ministers, and three ministers for the environment.

I can only hope Shorten knows what he is doing with the encryption legislation.

I would rather Labor had voted against it.

I can only conclude there was a high risk of the Lib gov’t setting up a ‘terrorist’ raid or event while claiming the Encryption Bill would have prevented it.

It is not as if they haven’t done this before. Someone gets arrested for buying a plastic sword, or gets arrested under terrorism legislation for nothing and goes free, no charges, months later when the headlines have died down.

Maybe that was Morrison and Dutton’s Big Plan for Christmas or Australia Day.

Whatever the plan, it has fallen on its face.

Now the gov’t will be dealing with the big ITC companies, who will not be pleased. The Minister responsible for Communication is going to be busy, I reckon.

I am reluctant to criticise Shorten because he has not put a foot wrong so far, and I assume there is a tactical reason for this vote.

Its bad for the software industry because suddenly the reputation of every tech company that operates in Australia has joined the ranks of Huawei in terms of trustworthiness, they have to operate under an world leading Authoritarian regime.

There is early talk of Amazon considering taking legal action against the Government, and speculation Apple could withdraw from the Australian market.

I hope so. The gov’t put this legislation up, and they got what they wanted. It does the ALP no good to refuse to support anything labelled a ‘Security Measure’.

The people voted in this rabble as their gov’t. So they get what this rabble serves up. (I wonder how many complaining about this legislation actually voted this gov’t into power?)

Far be it for Labor to interfere with the will of the people!

Now let the gov’t and the people can deal with what they wanted.

You keep giving someone what they want, over and over, until they do not want it anymore.

Why should the ALP damage their chances of winning the election to save the voters from themselves?